


Lost Time

by peterparkr



Series: Alternate Timeline [1]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Missing Scene, a little bit of, but it's mostly just
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-10
Updated: 2019-08-10
Packaged: 2020-08-14 00:28:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20183221
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peterparkr/pseuds/peterparkr
Summary: Tony finds 2012 Peter during the Time Heist





	Lost Time

**Author's Note:**

> Idea found [here!](https://irondad-fic-ideas.tumblr.com/)

“Do you trust me?”

“I do.”

Tony suppresses a smile, turns it into a slight twitch of his cheek. They’re getting there—finally finding some semblance of healing for the gaping wounds left by the mess that went down when they were younger. He wishes it could have happened under different circumstances, before half the world turned to dust, before they attempted a probable suicide mission into the past.

“Help!”

Tony whips his head to the side. “What was that? Did you hear that?”

Steve narrows his eyes.

“There was just a battle, remember? Rescue crews will get to them,” Scott says. “Now, what’s your plan? What’s going on?”

Tony ignores him and slides on his glasses. “FRIDAY, voice recognition?”

Steve’s giving Tony one of his signature looks. There was a time when he used to receive one of those at least once a week. 

“Tony,” he says. “We have a mission.”

Tony barely holds back a scathing retort about how there would be no goddamn mission without his invention. This little escapade into the past really is reverting them back to the good old days.

“It’s a match, boss.”

Tony’s eyes widen. He glances at Steve, then double taps the nanotech housing compartment on his chest. The armor starts to seep over his body.

“Okay,” he says. “Take five.”

“What? Stark, a lot is at stake here. What are you—“

Tony soars up before Scott can finish. He could have walked. The shout wasn’t from that far away. But, it gets him away from their protests.

He drops down by the wreckage of the building that FRIDAY directs him to, starts scanning the rubble for the owner of the voice.

“Peter,” he calls, hesitantly. “You here?”

“U-under here, help!”

Up close, the voice is even more unmistakable, albeit younger than Tony is used to. He hadn’t thought it could have been any higher.

Tony crouches, peering through the cracks of the destroyed scraps of the building. When his search comes up empty, he starts moving some of the smaller pieces of concrete and brick, careful not to disturb anything that could cause the precarious pile to collapse.

Finally, he moves a stone and a pair of glasses, one lens shattered, stare out at him from underneath it. The eyes behind them widen when they focus on Tony. 

“Iron Man,” mini Peter breathes.

Tony’s heart clenches. His hands shake a little, thankfully masked by the suit’s stabilizers, as he clears more of the rocks. Five years. Five years since he’s seen the kid’s face. Five years since Peter turned to ash right in his hands. He couldn’t save him then, but he can get him out from under this building now. It feels like a do-over, a twisted chance to prove himself.

“Tony,” he corrects.

“O-okay,” Peter says.

He’s clearly scared, pale and shivering despite the heat. But, he’s responsive and aware of his surroundings. It’s a good indication that he’s not severely injured, which means that Tony has time to figure out the best plan to get him out.

Tony takes a step back, assessing the situation. Even if he could clear all the debris that covers the hole he can see Peter through, the kid probably wouldn’t be able to fit out. Tony’s going to have to move the large slab of concrete on top of him.

“Listen up, kid.” Peter blinks up at him. “Can you move?”

His head bobs up and down.

“Perfect, come as close to me as you can and when I lift this up, crawl out, okay?”

More nods in rapid succession. 

“Count of three, I’m going to lift it. Ready? One—two—three.” Tony grips the edge of the stone and pushes up.

Peter scrambles out of the gap. Tony releases the slab and it slams back into place. He taps the compartment on his chest and his armor melts away. Peter’s jaw drops open.

“Woah, that’s so cool.” He looks from the glowing triangle to Tony’s face. “You look different than on TV.”

Tony laughs. “Well, you know what they say, the camera adds ten pounds and takes away ten years.”

Peter’s eyebrows knit together. He opens his mouth as if to question it, but changes his mind and closes it again. 

Tony kneels in front of him. It’s a little different than when he does the same thing with Morgan. With his daughter, they become pretty much the same height. Ten-year-old Peter is taller. Tony looks up at him, starting at the top of his head and working his way down, searching for injuries. There are some scrapes and bruises, ripped clothes, the broken glasses. Tony swipes some dusty debris out of his hair. The most concerning thing is how Peter’s cradling one arm with the other.

“Are you hurt?” 

Peter looks thoughtful. “My glasses fell off. One of the lenses is cracked.”

“Yeah, buddy, I can see that.” Tony plucks the frames off his face, inspects them. “I’ll get you a new pair, don’t worry. But, for now—”

Tony takes his own glasses out of his pocket, places them on Peter’s face. He can tell when they finish scanning Peter’s eyes and filling with his prescription because the boy’s face lights up.

“Awesome,” he mutters, gap-toothed smile shining up at Tony.

Tony mirrors the expression, but it feels forced. There’s a pressure behind his eyes that won’t stop building. He’s  _ not _ going to cry in front of this kid. He needs to keep fixing, to distract himself from past regrets and lost time.

“How about your arm?” He gestures to the awkward way Peter’s holding it.

“My wrist hurts—just a little.”

Tony exhales a slight laugh. That’s definitely a lie based off the way Peter draws it even closer into himself when Tony mentions it. So, the kid’s always been a bit reckless when it comes to his own health. It wasn’t something that came after the hero thing.

“Can I see it?”

Peter immediately lets go of the wrist and holds it towards Tony’s outstretched hands. He’s looking up with so much adoration and trust—not thinking for a second that Tony would do anything to hurt him. Tony swallows hard. He had broken that trust on Titan.

The wrist rests on one of his hands. He brings his other up and hovers above it for a moment before laying a ghost of a touch over the skin. When Peter flinches, he immediately draws the hand away. But, Peter doesn’t pull his own back. His face hasn’t changed at all, the trust still there. Tony tentatively starts examining the wrist again. It’s already turning black and blue. There’s a little bump that he assumes is a bone sticking out of place.

“Can you move it?”

“Not really,” Peter replies. “I don’t want to. It hurts.”

Tony sighs. “I think it’s broken, Pete.”

As soon as he says it, he wants to take it back. Kids take cues from adults about the severity of situations. Morgan had never minded bees flying around her when she played outside until she saw Tony screech and bat at one before running away. Now, she’s terrified of any bug with wings.

Sure enough, at the word ‘broken’, Peter’s bottom lip starts to wobble. 

“I thought it might be, but I didn’t want it to,” he says, quiet and shaky.

“You’re real tough, kid. First time I broke a bone, I passed out. But, look at you! Crawled out from under that rubble and everything.” Tony shrugs. “Which means either it’s not broken at all or you’re too strong for a little break to keep you down.”

It restores the smile, even if it’s not quite as bright as before. Tony gently places the definitely (despite what he told Peter) broken wrist back into it’s spot resting on Peter’s other arm.

“Tony.”

He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath at the voice.

“Captain America’s here, too,” Peter mumbles. “Cool, cool.”

Tony squeezes one of Peter’s shoulders before standing. Steve’s watching from about ten feet away. He nods and gestures for Tony to come over. Tony mock-salutes before crossing the short distance between them. If the motion annoys him, Steve does a fantastic job of refusing to show it. Tony can’t find a single muscle that shifts on his face.

“Is that—”

“Yes,” Tony interrupts, keeping his voice hushed so Peter won’t hear. “And I don’t particularly care what you have to say about it. He’s hurt and alone and he needs new glasses and—”

“I get it,” Steve says. “I sent Scott back. Get him home and then we’ll go finish this.”

Tony blinks and then squints at Steve. “Loki? Is that you?”

“Not you, too.” Steve rolls his eyes. “Just, lie low. You had a heart attack, remember?”

Tony grins and slaps him on the back before spinning back around to Peter. The kid’s eyes are still a little too misty for Tony’s liking, but it definitely could be worse.

“Did you really have a heart attack?” Peter stares at the nanotech compartment as if it might give him the answer.

Tony hesitates. It’ll be in the news anyway, within the hour most likely if it’s not already out there. The press will blow it out of proportion as usual, probably make some fuss about him not being fit enough to be an Avenger, or to help run his company. He’s getting a headache just thinking about it and he’s not even the Tony who will have to deal with it.

“Just a minor issue,” he says. “Don’t worry about it. The God of Thunder fixed me right up with his magic hammer.”

“Should you be walking around?”

“Told you, fixed by magic hammer.”

Peter’s eyes narrow. “What if you have another one?”

“Cap over there will call Thor, wielder of the magic hammer.”   


“Okay.” Peter draws out the word as he studies Tony’s face. “Then, how did you know my name?”

Tony glances over at Steve. The guy just smirks at Peter’s interrogation and shakes his head. Tony hoped that Peter might have been too out of it to notice that the name had slipped out a few times during the rescue.

“What is this, twenty-one questions?”

Peter laughs, but still watches Tony expectantly.

“You saw how those glasses could read your eyes and match them. They can scan people, too.”

Peter falls silent and Tony thinks that he’s got him, hook, line, and sinker. Instead, Peter’s nose twitches a little.

“So, you have facial recognition for everyone on earth—even random kids? Isn’t that illegal?”

He’s giving Tony a classic ‘gotcha’ head tilt combined with that wide smile. It reminds him mostly of Harley when they first met, but also a little bit of Morgan when she’s really laying on the sass. And the thing is he can see it—a life with all three of them in it. Sure, Peter and Harley would be older, but it would still be  _ good.  _ He wants it so bad. But, ten-year-old Peter never grows up to meet Morgan. He never really gets to grow up, fully, at all. Unless this whole heist works out. Tony’s not ready to put his faith in it yet. There are still too many variables, too many things that could go wrong.

Peter must notice his face fall, because the playful expression fades. “I’m so sorry, Mr. Stark. I didn’t mean it in a bad way. I was just kidding. Sorry.”

Tony clears his throat, ruffles Peter’s hair. He can feel Steve’s gaze on him but he ignores it.

“Didn’t I tell you to call me Tony? It’s my turn to ask questions now, okay?”

Peter nods. “Yes, sorry, um—Tony.”

“That’s better.” Tony’s lips stretch into a toothless smile. “Okay, my question: do you know where your aun—family is?”

Peter looks down at his feet. “I was with my uncle. But, we got separated when everyone started running.”

“That’s okay. I’ll help you find him.” 

Peter looks back up. “I know. You’re  _ Iron Man _ .”

There’s so much conviction—much more than Tony deserves. If this kid doesn’t make him cry by the end of the day, it’ll be a miracle.

* * *

Tony starts walking Peter in the direction of the nearest ER. The kid’s obviously in pain, probably needs a cast. Steve follows a few yards behind as Tony chatters to Peter about different things to distract him from his wrist and any fear. He gets Ben and May’s numbers and tries calling them a few times, to no avail.

When they pass an abandoned, but mostly intact gift store, Tony dips inside through the broken window. He gathers two ball-caps, two t-shirts, sweat-pants with ‘New York’ emblazoned on the butt and a pair of sunglasses. When he looks back, Peter is running his good hand over some mini replicas of the Statue of Liberty. Steve is giving Tony the look again.

“Oh, give me a break,” Tony says. “Not to rehash all this, but weren’t you a war criminal for years?”

Peter turns quickly at the words, knocking over one of the souvenirs in the process.

“You know this isn’t the same thing,” Steve says. “You’re stealing from the people who own this place.”

“Yeah, well, we can’t walk into an ER like this. We shouldn’t even be walking the streets.”

Peter starts rifling through his pockets. His hand emerges with a few crumpled dollar bills clasped inside. He holds them out to Tony. It’s so heart-breakingly young and  _ good _ . And that’s the thing about Peter—he is so good without even trying. It would have hurt to lose him even if he hadn’t been, but the general goodness makes it worse. He didn’t deserve it. He would have grown up to be better than all of them. Tony’s stomach twists into a painful knot.

“We could leave this for them.”

Tony waves the hand away. “Nope, that’s yours, kid. This is an adult problem. Tony Stark, remember? I’ll pay ‘em back.”

He makes his way towards Steve and shoves half the clothes into his hands.

“Change,” he says aloud before shifting his voice quieter. “Relax, I’ll get a message to JARVIS to make other me pay them.”

After they’ve donned their makeshift disguises, Steve exits the store first.

“You know, I think the rest of the country will be a little upset that New York gets its name on America’s property.”

Steve glances back at Tony with something between a glare and a smile. Peter giggles.

It helps to make jokes, to make them laugh. It stops him from thinking about the rest.

* * *

“I can’t believe aliens actually exist,” Peter says as Tony hoists him over yet another pile of them. 

The kid’s small for his age, but still too big for Tony to keep up this trend of lifting him over obstacles without a suit on. He can’t climb over them with the broken wrist, though. Well, maybe he could, but Tony doesn’t want him to fall and hurt himself even more. And Tony is not going to ask the supersoldier behind them for help unless he absolutely has to. He silently prays that the road ahead of them will start to clear off.

“My Uncle Ben always takes me onto the roof to look at the stars. He said that there was no way we were the only life in the universe. I guess he was right. I think he was talking more about bacteria and other microorganisms than um, these things, though.”

“Your uncle seems like a smart guy,” Tony says. 

And Peter clearly adores him. Tony hates to think about what the next few years hold for this poor kid.

Peter frowns. “Yeah, I hope he’s okay.”

Tony grimaces. Unless their presence here has changed things, Ben is fine, for now. 

“Do you think there are any friendly aliens? Or do they all want to invade us?” 

Tony’s glad that it’s him from the future here with Peter and not the one from this time. 2012 Tony would have freaked out on this kid, probably shouted at him and then run away in a panic.

“The guy who fixed me up with the hammer—he’s friendly  _ and  _ from a different planet. Don’t worry your little head about aliens. That’s for me and Mr. Rogers to figure out.”

Steve lets out a dry laugh.

* * *

The wait at the ER is long. It takes every scrap of self-control that Tony has to refrain from dropping his name and getting Peter in to a doctor faster. But, there are a lot of people who are hurt. Quite a few in more life-threatening ways than a broken wrist.

Peter looks at Tony when he chooses red as the color for his cast. It sends warmth through him, but also something sharper. He wants to get back to Morgan. He wants to stick around and watch this Peter grow up. He wants his own Peter back. He can’t have all three. The contradiction isn’t as stressful as it could be—Tony learned a long time ago that he doesn’t usually get all the things he wants.

“Do you want your grandpa to be the first to sign it?”

It snaps Tony out of his thoughts. He feels his face pale and glares at the back of the doctor’s head. His beard isn’t even that grey, neither is his hair if he were to take off the cap. He has a daughter way younger than Peter for god’s sake. He is  _ not  _ a grandpa.

Peter brings a hand up to his face to cover a snicker. “Yes! Sign it,  _ Grandpa _ !”

Tony refocuses the glare on Peter as he snatches the sharpie from the doctor.

Peter holds out his arm, almost bouncing on the cot from his excitement, smirking slyly. Tony glances from him to the watching doctor. Time to commit. He sighs, writes ‘grandpa’ in all caps. The word stares back at him. He feels dead inside.

He pockets the sharpie. No way the cast is staying like that.

They collect Steve from the waiting room and head back to the street. The wrist has been taken care of, all of Peter’s scrapes are covered by band-aids. Tony feels marginally better—all they have to do is find May and Ben.

“Does that say ‘grandpa’?” Steve asks, child-like glee lighting up his features.

Peter tells him what happened, words flying fast out of his mouth. He almost gets the whole thing out before Tony clamps a hand over it.

Tony shakes his head at Steve. “Choose your next words carefully, old man.”

Steve holds his hands up in surrender. 

“Time to sort out this mess,” Tony says, removing his hand from Peter’s mouth and grabbing his arm instead. He takes the sharpie out of his pocket and strikes a line through ‘grandpa’, signing his name off to the side instead. Tony remembers Peter’s words when he had removed that first rock earlier and adds ‘Iron Man’ in parentheses beneath it.

“Wow,” Peter says. “I can’t wait to show Ned.”

Tony recognizes the familiar name—Peter’s guy in the chair. Another kid wiped off the planet. They’d been friends for longer than Tony had thought. 

“See?” Tony drops Peter’s arm. “Broken bones aren’t so bad.”

He probably shouldn’t encourage the kid to end up more reckless than he already turns out to be.

“Yeah.” Peter looks deep in thought. “Pretty awesome.”

Oops.

* * *

After some debating between Tony and Steve, they decide to take Peter to his apartment via the suit. Tony summons the nanoparticles back into the compartment as Peter raps on the door.

A man that Tony has only seen in pictures opens it. He’s a little beat up from the battle, too. There are stitches on his forehead and a brace around his right ankle.

“Peter, oh thank god,” he says before crouching and wrapping the kid into a hug.

Ben looks up from over Peter’s shoulder. Tony had taken off the cap and cheap sunglasses before putting on the suit, so as soon as Ben’s eyes land on him, they widen. They flick over to Steve and stretch even farther.

“Look who saved me!” Peter whisper-yells into his uncle’s ear.

Ben lets go of Peter and straightens, leaving a single hand on one of his shoulders. Peter spins to grin at Tony.

He steps forward, extending a hand. “Nice to meet you, I’m Tony.”

“Yeah.” Ben stares at the hand for a second before shaking it. “My wife said you had a heart attack.”

“He did! But an alien with a magic hammer fixed it.” Peter says it with a hint of impatience; Tony can hear the underlying  _ keep up, Uncle Ben. _ “Where’s May?”

“She’s out looking for you.” Ben fiddles with the cast on Peter’s arm, tracing over Tony’s writing, before looking up. “Thank you for keeping him safe. And the city, too. But mostly Peter. Thank you.”

“Of course.”  _ Always  _ dies in his throat. “We tried calling.”

“Phone lines must be down.”

“Yeah, probably.”

Tony’s lingering and he knows it. The conversation is bordering on stilted. Steve is shifting his weight from one foot to the other every few seconds. Peter leans into his uncle’s side. Tony doesn’t want to look away.

But he has to.

“Well.” He sniffs. “It was—nice to meet you, Peter. No more buildings falling on top of you, okay? At least for a few more years.”

Peter grins. “Only if you quit the heart-attacks, grandpa.” 

He ducks into Ben’s side after he says it, glancing at Tony to check if he’d crossed a line.

“Peter,” Ben admonishes, watching Tony warily. “That’s—he didn’t mean that, Mr. Sta—“

“I’ll miss you, kiddo.” He’s blinking rapidly and now would really be the time to slide the sunglasses back on, but he’s afraid they’d see right through the action.

Ben stammers out a few more apologies and thank you’s. Steve nudges Tony and subtly starts guiding him away from the Parker’s doorstep. Tony knows he’s being difficult, resisting and dragging his feet, but he can’t help it. It’s losing the kid all over again. As they get closer to the stairwell, he starts reluctantly picking up his pace.

“Mr. Star—Tony!” It’s followed by fast, approaching footsteps.

When he turns around, Peter is almost caught up to them. The kid points at his face. “You forgot your glasses!”

He had forgotten. Tony takes a second just to look at them. They’re too big for Peter and they’re crooked—the right side dips lower than the left. But, Tony had grown used to seeing them perched upon Peter’s nose in that fashion throughout the day.

He holds out his hand and Peter drops the glasses into them. Tony puts them on, quickly issues a few commands to FRIDAY to disable most functions until they’re an ordinary pair of glasses, except that the prescription will change with Peter’s eyes. He takes them off and slides them onto Peter, adjusting them a bit so that they don’t sit skewed on his face.

“Keep ‘em,” Tony says.

Peter touches the edges of them as they match his eyesight. He looks up at Tony, mouth slightly ajar. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah. If you don’t break them, you might just grow into them one day.”

Tony barely gets the words out before Peter throws his arms around him.

“Thank you,” Peter mumbles into his shirt.

Tony squeezes once, as tight as he can, before letting go and pushing Peter back toward his apartment.

Peter runs inside and then peaks out from his door one more time. “Bye!”

Tony doesn’t trust himself to speak so he just waves. His shoulders droop as soon as Peter’s out of sight. 

“We’re going to get him back, Tony,” Steve says. 

Tony clears his throat, nods without looking up. He’s sure as hell going to try his best. It’s time to put his whole faith in this heist—it’s the only chance they have.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for reading!
> 
> I have such a clear image of little Peter with the glasses and the cast in my head and I'd love to actually see it, so if any of you lovely artists out there would like to draw something like that I would absolutely adore it!
> 
> Come yell about tony stark w/ me on [tumblr!](https://peterparkrr.tumblr.com)
> 
> Check out some of my other works if you're interested in any of them :)


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